Giving Up

Nathan Curnow

Spring 2017

Giving up is such a long, slow slide,
something Icarus knew nothing about,
he fell so fast there was barely time
to lose faith in youth or flight.
How lucky to miss the monstrous tow
of tiny tugs that bring you down,
the kind you feel on backyard nights
lying out on the old trampoline.
And you know it’s over but you work
and drink, working less and drinking more,
the clip and creak of rusty springs
whingeing louder year after year.
But to plummet from the heights
of wild belief like Icarus across the sky,
his father’s quest for freedom and family,
another man who tried to have it all.
Athena brought Daedalus brand new wings
urging him to fly once more like a god—
a long-winded trail of promise to bear
with a name pronounced ‘dead’ and ‘loss’.